EF1 tornado, Bertice to Freeny, Mississippi, April 25, 2015

1. EF065 to 85 mph

   Light damage. Surface peeled off some roofs, gutters and siding damaged, branches broken, shallow-rooted trees pushed over.

2. EF186 to 110 mphthis tornado

   Moderate damage. Roofs badly stripped, mobile homes overturned or badly damaged, exterior doors lost, windows broken.

3. EF2111 to 135 mph

   Considerable damage. Roofs torn off well-built houses, frame homes shifted on their foundations, mobile homes destroyed, large trees snapped or uprooted, cars lifted off the ground.

4. EF3136 to 165 mph

   Severe damage. Whole stories of well-built houses destroyed, large buildings badly damaged, trains overturned, trees debarked, heavy cars lifted and thrown.

5. EF4166 to 200 mph

   Devastating damage. Well-built houses leveled, structures with weak foundations moved some distance, cars thrown and large missiles generated.

6. EF5over 200 mph

   Incredible damage. Strong frame houses swept off their foundations, car-sized missiles thrown more than 100 meters, steel-reinforced concrete badly damaged, high-rise buildings deformed.

7. Unrated

   The survey recorded a tornado but could not put a number on it, most often because it crossed open country and damaged nothing a rating can be read from.

Rating

EF1

Date

April 25, 2015

Touchdown

2:28 AM CDT (07:28 UTC)

Lifted

2:32 AM CDT (07:32 UTC)

On the ground

4 minutes

Path length

3.4 miles (5.4 km)

Path width

500 yards (457 m)

Deaths

0

Injuries

0

Property damage

$200,000

County

Leake County

Touchdown point

32.690, -89.528

Lift-off point

32.706, -89.473

Record number

1504250128-01

5 damage points were recorded along this path by NWS JAN, in the Damage Assessment Toolkit the survey teams carry. The strongest indicator was rated EF1. The highest wind the damage implies is 94 mph.

• Couple trees uprooted, tin off old mobile home
• Shingles off roof of well built house, lots of limbs snapped, trampoline vaulted
• Number of trees uprooted and broken shingles off house

Survey points are preliminary and are the raw material the published rating was built from. Source: NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit.

Late on the evening of Friday, April 24th into the early morning hours of Saturday, April 25th, a complex of severe thunderstorms pushed eastward across central Mississippi. These storms were produced by a shortwave trough pushing across the Mid South region and were sustained by strong deep layer wind shear. Damaging straight-line wind gusts and a few weak tornadoes occurred along the path of the storms. Several trees and power poles/lines were downed, some onto structures. Notably, an 83 mph wind gust was measured near Onward in Sharkey County. Tornadoes were confirmed in Madison, Neshoba, Kemper and Leake counties. A few areas in the ArkLaMiss Delta also received very heavy rain producing flash flooding.

This tornado started just west of Highway 25 snapping several trees. After crossing Highway 25, the tornado strengthened and widen, snapped and uprooted dozens of trees as it crossed Highway 13 and Old Highway 13. The tornado then crossed into the bottomland along the Pearl River where it appears to have dissipated. The maximum estimated wind speed was 105 mph.

Several trees were snapped and uprooted in a narrow path that crossed Mississippi Highway 25. Maximum estimated winds were 75 mph.

This tornado started just west of Highway 35, snapping several trees in a residential area where it also caused shingle damage to a couple of homes and flipped a trampoline. After crossing Highway 35, it intensified a bit and began causing more extensive tree damage and damaged another roof. As the tornado passed east northeast along Highway 488, it reached the maximum width and intensity, snapping and uprooting dozens of trees and damaging two homes. The tornado dissipated shortly after passing Freeny Road. The maximum estimated wind speed was 110 mph.

From NOAA NCEI's Storm Events Database, the narrative the local forecast office wrote for Storm Data.

27 minutes of warning. NWS JAN issued a tornado warning for this county at 07:01 UTC, 27 minutes before the tornado touched down, in force until 07:45 UTC.

The county was under a tornado watch, issued at 05:56 UTC and running to 08:22 UTC.

Every warning and watch covering the touchdown point that day, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service products. Lead time is measured from the issue of the warning in force to the touchdown time in the database, both of which were recorded to the minute by different people.

The Storm Prediction Center had this point in a Marginal Risk. The outlook in force was issued at 05:55 UTC.

SPC's Day 1 convective outlook as it stood when the tornado began, read at the touchdown point. The same archive is on the radar archive.

The radiosonde launches on either side of the tornado, from the nearest station that was launching then, drawn and analyzed the way Storm Lab does: the same diagram, the same parcel and shear definitions SPC's mesoanalysis uses.

Local storm reports within 60 km of the path, in the three hours either side.

From the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service local storm reports.

The live radar over the trackEvery 2015 tornado in MississippiEvery tornado in Mississippi since 1950Warnings in force in Mississippi nowThe forecast where you are

9 more were confirmed in the United States that day.

Ratings are the survey's, read off the damage rather than measured; the rating scale is above. Tornado counts rise through the record as reporting improved, so a year in the 1950s is not comparable with one today except for the strongest tornadoes, which were always noticed.

NOAA Storm Prediction Center tornado database, 1950-2025, the official record kept by NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.